When the passengers from the Salt Lake flight deplaned, Layton James was head and shoulders above others around him. Chance wondered if the investigator had needed two seats on that pint-sized commuter.
It was nearly 7:30 in the evening. The plane had been almost an hour late. Backed up in Salt Lake with the evening commuter traffic, Chance figured. They shook hands. “Bet you’re hungry.”
“Dang right,” James said. “And thirsty too, if you know what I mean.”
“A couple of hours in Mormon country will do that to you,” Chance joked. “I made a reservation for you at the Copper Baron Hotel just across from the airport, like you asked. There’s a restaurant and a bar.”
“I want the biggest steak in town,” James said and patted his ample midriff, already tightly encased in a dress shirt and tie.
“You got ’er,” Chance said. He liked a man with a healthy appetite. “Let’s go over to the Lamplighter. It’s just five minutes from here and I think you’ll like the menu.”
Half an hour later, Layton James had settled for a king-sized, 32-ounce slab of prime rib, enough for a family of four, washed down by his first Moose Drool. Chance felt like a wimp eating a measly eight-ounce strip steak. After an initial satisfaction of his hunger with two gargantuan bites of beef, James said with a grin, “Must be the altitude.”
Somehow, Chance had the feeling that Layton James ate this way all the time. But the food didn’t stop him from talking.
“The guy who runs Moab Aviation, man named Jeppsen, said he gave Simian a Jeep to get into town the night he arrived. Said the keys were hung back on the hook in the office where they belonged the next morning. Made him wonder if whoever brought the car back was local and knew where the keys went.”
Chance had met Jeppsen on a trip with Hardy several summers before—a retired geologist who made his living flying aerial tours of Canyonlands and Arches, catering to rich rock hounds.
“He was off in the back of beyond scouting geologic formations early in the morning,” James said between bites. “Said the plane was gone before he got back.”
So someone who knew Jeppsen’s habits could have easily timed their departure to coincide with when the airport was virtually empty. But they would have had to know there was a plane for the taking. That could mean Simian might have shot off his mouth about his plane to someone. “Did Simian hook up with anybody local the night before? Unless the theft was totally random, some townie had to have known he had flown in.”
“The sheriff was asking around. But until Simian regains consciousness, who knows? His credit card shows he stayed at a fancy bed and breakfast at the north end of town, but they didn’t see him come in with anybody and they didn’t see him leave the next day. ”
That wasn’t surprising. Simian would have left early. Anybody doing serious biking in Moab, even in September, would want to do it before the sun rose too high overhead. The situation had worked right into the thief’s hands.
Again, the circumstances pointed to someone local who knew how to make sure no one would see Simian picked up or dropped off. And who knew when the airport might likely be empty. Once Simian had cycled away, the airplane was easy pickings. But the question remained, who did the picking?
* * *
Anxious to make an early start with Sheriff Solheim the next morning, Layton James left Chance at the front desk of the Copper Baron. It was already 9 o’clock, so Chance stuck his head into Shoestring Annie’s, curious to see if the FBI had stopped in for their nightcap.
It was Comedy Night, and the bar was crowded with the college crowd there for the guffaws. Chance sidled between the tables looking for Perryman and his partner, but no luck. Instead, he saw Hardy Jacobs standing at one of the bars along the wall, in deep conversation with a sturdy looking guy who looked like he could use a good laugh.
Chance fought his way to the bar for a Moose Drool. By the time he reached Hardy, his friend was moving to the far end of the room. Hardy seemed surprised to see Chance. “What brings you down to the Flat to do your drinking?” he asked.
It was true that Chance rarely ventured this far from uptown unless he was going flying. “Business,” he said and rolled his eyes. “Who was your buddy? Hope I didn’t scare him off.”
“Just some guy I know from working in Big Sky. He lives in Bozeman.”
Chance had never reconciled Hardy’s decision to winter at the upscale ski resort in the Gallatin Mountains south of Bozeman. Well-to-do out-of-staters, mostly Californians, liked to throw big parties and not invite the locals. Hardy was part of the service class who eked out a living on the mountain while crammed into mobile homes at the bottom. Meanwhile, their clientele lived large in fancy chalets. It just wasn’t Hardy’s style, being at anybody’s beck and call just because they had money.
“So what kind of business?” Hardy asked.
“Just dropped off a guy I been interviewing about the plane crash on Sunday. A couple of FBI agents are staying here too. Wouldn’t mind getting a word in with them if I can.”
“You still working for the Messenger?” Hardy asked. “What happened to remodeling historic buildings full-time?”
“Restoration,” Chance corrected him. “That’s still the main plan, but I had to help out with the paper until Mesa came back to town. I don’t do much writing usually, but this plane crash story has me curious. I’d like to meet the guy who landed that plane. And so would the FBI. Haven’t seen any clean-cut, out-of-town suits come in tonight, have you?”
“Not yet,” Hardy said. “How do they figure in it?”
Chance took a long swig from his beer and began to explain. Maybe Hardy would have some idea about the Moab connection. “You read about the plane crash?”
“My dad said something about it,” Hardy said. His words came slowly, his lips barely opened wide enough to let the words escape. “Gutsy.”
Chance smiled. Hardy was never a big talker, but the words he used fit. “You can say that again. Anybody else would have ended that landing with a nose plant.”
“I thought the pilot died in the crash,” Hardy said.
“Nah,” Chance said. “That guy was already dead when the plane hit the ground.”
“Gives new meaning to a dead stick landing, that’s for sure.” Hardy said, his voice half-joking and half-amazed. “What do you think happened?”
Chance shrugged. “Can’t tell. All they know for sure is that the dead guy didn’t exactly have a lot of friends.”
“Somebody local?” Hardy asked.
Chance shook his head again. “An ex-convict just released from prison a couple a days ago,” Chance said and noticed Kev Murphy in a crowd at the far end of the long bar, laughing and swilling a beer with a group of guys.
“Whose plane?” Hardy asked.
“Belonged to some business exec from Nebraska, but the plane came from Moab.”
“No shit?” Hardy said. He seemed curious now.
Chance nodded. “Looks like somebody just waltzed into Doc Jeppsen’s place, picked the keys off the board, and flew away.”
“Doc was probably rock hounding. What did the plane’s owner have to say?”
“Busted his head riding down White Rim Trail. When the rescue squad picked him up, he didn’t have any ID. Nobody knew who he was. Good thing his buddies biked out a day early and came looking for him. That’s when the police came looking for the plane and found it missing.”
Hardy shook his head and smiled. “Riding alone, no ID. No corner on stupidity. Hurt bad?”
“Well, he’s not feeling any pain right now. He’s in a coma.”
“You’re kidding,” Hardy said. “You figure he’s connected to the dead guy?”
Chance smiled. “Now, Hardy, you’re starting to scare me, thinking like a cop.”
“Just curious, is all,” Hardy chuckled.
“I sure as hell can’t figure a connection. The dead guy apparently came to Butte to see a woman here. Far as anyone knows, he came straight from the state prison in Idaho and had never been anywhere near Moab.”
“You mean he had a girlfriend in Butte?” Hardy said in disbelief.
“Guess it depends on who you ask,” Chance said, thinking about the letter Lowell had kept with him.
“Turns out the woman is the daughter of a man the ex-convict killed.”
“Straight up?” Hardy said and whistled faintly. “Man, this sounds like a soap opera.” The announcer had reached the mike on stage and was getting ready to introduce the next comedian. “I’m gonna get another beer. Want one?”
Chance made one more sweep of the bar and, seeing neither Perryman nor his partner, shook his head. “I got a date with a lady,” he said and made his way to the exit and the parking lot.
* * *
“What do you think changed Mesa’s mind?” Adrienne asked. She had fashioned a bedroom space in the loft apartment by angling two bamboo screens together in one corner. She and Chance cuddled under a duvet on the futon. No wham-bam, thank-you ma’am for him.
“I’m not sure she has changed her mind,” Chance said, resting his chin atop Adrienne’s head and stroking her arm. “She’s just sorry she said anything.”
“My sister came around expediently when I told her you looked mature,” Adrienne said with a smile. When Chance didn’t laugh, she continued, “Of course, it is true that when you were starting first grade, I was already in med school.”
Chance grinned at the thought of Adrienne, the eager, fresh-faced med student. If he had seen her when he was six, he might just have fallen for her then, too. “Yeah, well, that was twenty-five years ago and now I’m bigger, if not smarter.” He turned her face toward him and they kissed again.
“And what else?” Adrienne asked.
Chance liked that she could tell he was preoccupied, not pressing him to make love again like she might otherwise.
He reached for the pint container of huckleberry ice cream next to the bed, half-eaten before they had succumbed to temptations more carnal. “I think part of what’s bothering Mesa is that she’s uneasy, feeling her way around at the paper. This afternoon she got more involved with the crash story. Maybe that lifted her spirits.”
“Involved how?” Adrienne asked and took the teaspoon full of ice cream from him.
“She tracked down the woman Lowell Austin wrote to.”
“Good for Mesa,” Adrienne said, her tone genuinely enthusiastic. “Anybody you know?”
Chance took the spoon back and shook his head. “But that doesn’t stop the story from getting weirder.” He described Kathy DiNunzio’s revenge plot gone wrong. “I’m still blown away that some soccer mom would go that far.”
Adrienne mused for a moment, and then said, “If you lost a parent when you were a child, you might fixate on getting even. You might not ever reach the place where you recognize that serious revenge usually means risking a great deal—which is more or less the conclusion the rest of us reach.”
Chance smiled at her, holding her in his gaze.
“What?” she said, beginning to blush.
“You’re so clever and smart,” he said and fed her a spoonful of ice cream. Chance almost lost his train of thought watching Adrienne slowly lick ice cream from her lips.
“Do you think she had anything to do with Austin’s death?” she asked.
“Mesa seems to think the woman is genuinely sorry for what happened to Austin. Supposedly, she and her kids were at Georgetown Lake when the crash took place. So unless she’s a pathological liar, I’d say she’s off the hook.”
“So you’re without a suspect again,” Adrienne said.
“Maybe not. I talked to this insurance investigator about the plane,” Chance said, carefully apportioning the last of the ice cream between them. “It was stolen from an airport in Moab. Belonged to some mountain-biking enthusiast with more money than brains.”
“Why do you say that?” she asked, her smile bathing him in warmth. She always had another question.
“He went down into Canyonlands solo and then crashed his bike. Took a day and a half to figure out who he was.”
“Somebody could have borrowed his plane while he was gone.”
Chance smiled and gave her his last bite of ice cream. “He’s one hell of a generous guy if he lent somebody his $100,000 plane.”
“So, maybe they didn’t ask.”
“Well, maybe when he comes out of his coma, he can tell us all about it.”
“If he’s in a coma, he may not remember anything one way or the other when he does wake up.”
“Think so?” Chance said and put the ice cream carton back on the floor. He didn’t buy the notion that Simian had lent his plane to anyone. As far as Layton James knew, Simian had hardly talked to anybody in Moab, let alone knew anyone there well enough to hand over the keys to his Cessna.
Out of ice cream, they made love again—grizzly bear love, Chance called it, on account of the huckleberries. They teased each other about who tasted sweeter and fell asleep in each other’s arms.
Chance was awakened by the sound of his own voice yelling, “Unlatch the doors, quick, before we hit the ground!”
Then, strangely, he heard Adrienne. “Chance, Chance, it’s okay.”
Chance turned toward the voice and then realized he was sitting up, with Adrienne next to him stroking his chest, talking softly.
“What was that all about?” she asked.
Chance realized he had been dreaming about crashing his plane. He took a deep breath, hoping to slow his pounding heart. He shook his head and chuckled to himself. “Investigating this crash is taking its toll.”
“You were talking about doors,” she said with a puzzled look on her face.
“The cabin doors. Fitz used to say if you think you’re coming down hard, at the last minute unlatch the doors so they don’t jam on impact.” He looked at her and shook his head. “Like you could remember to do anything at that point besides pray.”
They lay back down and snuggled under the covers. Soon he felt the steady breathing that signaled she had fallen back asleep. He lay there in the dark, wishing he could do the same.
Instead, he kept going over what Layton James had told him about Moab. While Simian couldn’t be completely ruled out, he hadn’t been the pilot of the plane that flew to Butte. The question remained whether he could be connected to Austin’s death and whoever else had been in the plane.
Chance would let the FBI use all their resources to cross-reference Simian’s and Austin’s lives. Maybe something would come of it, but Chance could do nothing about that one way or the other.
His thoughts drifted to Hardy. He was accustomed to making the rounds of Butte bars when he came home, but what was he doing at Shoestring Annie’s on Comedy Night, which he always claimed to hate? The comedians were too lame. And what was he doing driving one of his father’s trucks? Chance had seen the Yukon Glass pickup in the parking lot. Like most Montanan guys, Hardy drove a classy pickup and was usually damn proud of it.
He wondered too, if that was who Mesa had hooked up with last night at Mercury Street. Not that he was going to act like it was any of his business. Not after Mesa’s apology.
Maybe tomorrow he would talk to Kathy DiNunzio himself. And he would ask Rollie Solheim for another look at the evidence photos of the plane’s interior. Something in the photographs of the cockpit of that plane bothered him.